Murders Among Dead Trees by Chute Robert Chazz

Author:Chute, Robert Chazz [Chute, Robert Chazz]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Ex Parte Press
Published: 2014-01-11T05:00:00+00:00

OVER & OUT

Through several stories, you’ll see that tinnitus recurs. There’s a reason for that. I had it. At one point, I was sure it was a brain tumour and, if it didn’t kill me, I was sure it would drive me insane. I used stress reduction techniques and after a long time, it went away. I guess it wasn’t a tumour. ~ Chazz

My two-year-old son wailed, “No!” from his crib. His cry told me he was asleep. It was another bad dream. I rubbed his back, my touch so light I just smoothed his pyjama top. Frankie sucked his thumb hard. One eye rolled open for a moment, like a vacant nod to a passing stranger. He was on his way back to deeper sleep, though the intensity of his self-soothing hardly abated. He bears the mark of a dedicated thumbsucker — a tough little red callous at the knuckle of his left thumb — and I worry that he might screw up his teeth if he keeps it up too long. If Josy were here, he would be toilet trained by now.

Emily slept through Frankie’s nightmare. Teenagers seem exhausted all the time, or maybe that’s just Emily. The alarm clock by her bed doesn’t even wake her for school some mornings. Even when she is awake and getting ready for school, she seems distant, as if she is still dreaming in a small, warm place. She is stronger than me, but fathers don’t have the option to act sullen.

I tip-toed into the bathroom, avoiding the squeakiest floorboards. When Josy and I bought the slouching house on Seaside Road, she and the real estate agent went on and on about how great the old floors were. Now with two kids, it seems the bare, shiny floors are for sliding and banging up knees and elbows. I can’t walk the floors at night without thinking I’ll wake the children.

When Josy still lived here, I don’t remember worrying about the noise the floors made. It was as if two adults roaming a creaky house cancelled each other out with the white noise of living. Why is “antique” so valued when “old” sucks so much? Why do we hold on to things we should have thrown out long ago? Do our atoms mix so much over time with other people and things that, in some unseen way, we mistake the things we own for ourselves?

Noise first became a problem when I began fighting with my wife. Sometimes Josy and I would take the baby monitor out to the car in the garage so Emily wouldn’t hear us yelling. We cooperated in that, at least, so we could hear Frankie if he woke crying, catching our discordant vibe through the ether.

I can’t sleep, except in stolen snatches of disturbing dreams I can’t quite remember on waking. The rest of the night I disappear into a book or escape into late-night infomercials for products I would never use.

At three in the morning, television becomes a time machine.

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